Omoto-kyo version, Tokyo version, Iwama version…

…I think we had O’Sensei’s Omoto-kyo version and his Tokyo version and his Iwama version and we don’t understand that: but his Omoto-kyo version was actually about penetrating the universe. And people in Tokyo, recovering from being utterly bombed out by American B-29’s… well, it’s tricky to get them interested, because they’re trying to eat. And the guys in Iwama are out in the country, going “I’m so glad we’re out here!” and most of them are high school kids… But Omoto-kyo folks would have been ready to start setting the whole world aright, and to start raising people up… They would have remembered what Deguchi said: “everything happens first to Omoto-kyo, then to Japan, and finally to the whole world…” And they would have understood the aikido that O’Sensei was showing them to be a part of this…

calligraphy by Onisaburo Deguchi: “August 15th DAY” – being the date of Japan’s surrender, the character for “DAY” being drawn in the archaic style that also means “GOD”, and, with a variant center: “SU” – that is: AME-NO-MINAKA-NUSHI – that is: a new beginning.